Is the new Toybaru going to be competitive in CS?
 

I haven't seen a fully prepped one at the autox in CS. Has anyone seen a competitive driver on slicks and see how they fare?

Yep they are

Doubtful. One showed up at my division last weekend. Was a two driver car.....best time was 4 seconds behind the M Coupe that took first (I was not there to witness or compete). Hoping he shows up this weekend too so we can settle the dispute.

Good enough to take the overall RTR (11 entrants) win at the Packwood National Tour event.

The Sports Car Club of America - Solo

Its tough to say right now. I think its too heavy compared to the miatas and is also hampered by really short gearing and an unkind rev limiter. With the MSR and ZOK out next year and people putting more development time into some of the other cars in the class who knows.

What's the biggest rubber you can fit on it, 245 all around or even 265? Power seems to be on par with the rx-8 with a little less top end from what I can see.

fwiw

ouch

Just watched very well driven Scion toyubi. Dynamically they are awesome. Probably one of best handling cars out there but power wise they suck. Think only course where they might do well is slower twisty turny where they stay in second gear. But man they are slow in the straights!

Managed to get out to the Toledo ProSolo this morning and catch some of the BRZ's runs. It definitely seemed competitive once it got up to speed but its launches were just awful.

The acceleration is depressing, but then the RX-8 was the same way and no one seem to be able to beat it.

I found this thread while searching for something else. I have a BRZ I'm looking to campaign in CS. I'm good friends with Chris Fenter and we've talked quite a bit about the car in CS.

Power is definitely the biggest issue with the car. It also has a torque dip of 15-20 lb-ft between 3200-4200 RPM which hampers the car. It seems they made a choice to give the car decent low end torque, and decent high end torque, but at the expense of the dip in the middle.

245s are probably the widest A6 you can fit with a legal offset rim due to front strut clearance, that's what I'm planning on running. The car has 17x7 +48 rims stock. Hoosier just came out with a 275/35/17 which might fit, but it's hard to say and it'd be very pinched on a 17x7 rim.

A stock car can pretty easily get down to about 2650lbs. It doesn't have issues with fuel starvation so you can run it with almost no gas. FR-S is about 20lbs lighter than the top model BRZ, not a huge difference.

FR-S has quite a bit softer front springs than the BRZ, and slightly higher rears, so it has more of a tendency to oversteer but with stickier tires it hasn't shown to be uncontrollable. Sam Strano owns an FR-S he is doing development on and has driven it a couple of events and found it very controllable, mainly complained about lack of torque. :)

The car has NO camber adjustment stock, but it does have front crash bolts which can give ~1.0 degree more camber in the front, the highest I've seen is around -1.8 but most in the -1.5 area. Rear stock is usually around -1 but it's not adjustable and I've seen guys end up with like -1.5 on one side and -.8 on the other...

I think it can definitely be competitive in CS, but if the MSR/Z0K are booted out the 370Z might be the car to have especially on nationals style courses. If you notice in the Toledo Pro results, the guy running a BRZ in RT actually beat the two guys running in CS, even with much slower 60' times. The 60' times for the CS BRZ were about the same as Chris in his MX5. Guys drag racing have gotten 2.0s in it, but those are experienced drag racers. I think with the top two cars gone it will be an interesting battle between the 370Z,MX5,RX-8,BRZ/FR-S.

I think STX (which the car is not yet classed in, but probably will be) will be the best class for the car. Shops have been getting 30-40whp/25+ lb-ft gains with STX legal mods and being able to raise the rev limiter helps with the short 2nd gear gearing. They have also been able to shorten the duration of the torque dip to about 5-600 RPM.

The car is a blast to drive though even with the lack of torque and I can't wait to get it out and autocross it. Still a couple weeks away for our next local event.

Good luck, I think the car would be good in STX too

As far as Toledo goes....it was a course that a well driven ZOK or MSR wouldn't lose on. I got down to the 27's on each side in the bonus challenge, but sucked during comp runs on the right.

Should also mention that Learic would have been second in CS had she run open class (she won L2) in her CS 370z. Her total time was 59.50x. Fenter got down to 57.6 on Sunday runs.

You keep saying that but the RX-8 has 50 more bhp. The RX-8's are fast but have not done well nationally with a few exceptions since the merger.

It will be an interesting class with the MSR and ZOK gone especially if the current class leaders switch to a different car and stay with the class.

I'm a little surprised the BRZ/FRS can only fit a 245. With the rest of the class on 265's, 285's, or 295's, being able to squeeze the 275 seems critical.